How can I deal with anxiety better?

My good friend. If you are listening to this, you are investing in your personal mindset, and that is straight up intelligent. So thank you for being here. Thank you for your humility, your soft-heartedness, and for taking a few moments out of your day to consider some new ideas. Your question "How do I deal with anxiety better?" is an excellent one.

Now, I may not know every detail about your life. In fact, I know nothing, but I can absolutely share with you the most effective short and long term techniques to help you address and deal with anxiety and stress. By the way, just to differentiate a little bit, Stress and Anxiety are not the same, but they do have some similarities and most of the time some people join them together. I'm telling you this because I want you to realize that some of these strategies you can utilize with stress.

I'll do another podcast on stress another time, but the main difference that you really need to know is that stress is usually brought about by external circumstances like deadlines, work, relational demands, feeling overwhelmed, whereas anxiety is a bit more internal. Of course, external events can trigger moments of anxiety and panic, but anxiety can have its roots in our biology and definitely in our psychology.

So let's get to work. But actually, before we do, I want to add just a little bit of understanding to this mix. There is no doubt that knowledge is powerful. Understanding something a little better increases our ability to deal with it and to respond to it in a much more intelligent way. And my friend, becoming more intelligent is what you and I are here to do.

So first, anxiety. And I love anxious brains. They are genius brains. They're a bit obsessive. And what I mean by obsessive is I mean that anxious brains have a tendency to become stuck. It's almost as if the automatic shifter inside your brain malfunctions a little bit some of the times, and they get stuck in first gear. Imagine driving a car that is stuck in first gear, right?

Well, that's just how an anxious person's brain looks like when it gets stuck obsessing and anticipating. Anxiety is a disorder of anticipation. That means, and you're going to love this, that the brain begins to project itself into the future in such a powerful way that you begin to experience it in your body as if it was happening right this instance!! A good way to think of this is to think of it like a dream.

Whether you're flying, falling, swimming, fighting or having a nightmare, nothing is happening outside of you. Everything is happening inside of your brain. But it happens in such a powerful way that your body experiences it as if it is reality. Anxiety is the same thing, except you're awake. Anxiety is also a disorder of avoidance. Let me dig into that just a little bit.

Anxiety is painful. It's not pleasant. So things that create feelings of anxiety in your life, you will naturally want to avoid because your body just interprets it as pain. And our body and brain naturally want to draw us away from anything that is painful. Your brain is a survivalistic organ, and so that's what it does and why it does it.

The problem with this, is that anxiety can ultimately reduce and encompass your life, literally surrounding your life, so that your freedom to choose your liberty is literally at risk. I do not want, and I hope you don't either, for anxiety, stress or fear to drive your life. You have to be in the driver's seat. You have to be the one driving that brain and that body to pursue those things in life that are fun, that are meaningful, that are intelligent, that are purposeful, that are filled with goodness and morally correct.

Fear or anxiety can not dictate your life. Thus, this podcast is all about you reclaiming that territory and giving you the skills to do so. It's about you moving forward in the direction of your most important objectives, regardless of the fear and anxiety that may appear. I'm going to tell you something that may surprise you. It surprised me back in the day and it's just a short quote, a short idea.

And this idea is that "you are not your thoughts, you are not your feelings." In other words, just because your brain thinks or feels something, it doesn't mean that it is. Now, you may want to chew on that fat for a moment, but it is absolutely true. So here's a quick tool to help you decide which thoughts you may want to consider and take action with and which ones are basically worry and anxiety speak, and not important.

So here's a key. If a thought is helpful, if it motivates you, if it inspires you, if it's optimistic, hopeful, problem solving focused, if it empowers you, now then that is a thought and a feeling worth listening to and definitely one that you want to take action on. If your thoughts leave you feeling powerless, hopeless. If your thoughts are demeaning, harsh, pessimistic, focused just on the problems, complaining, if it drags you down, if it stalls you, if it paralyzes you, then these are unhelpful thoughts that you can gently and simply label that thought as, Oh man, that's my anxious brain, or that's just anxiety speaking to me, and I don't need to do what they are asking me to do.

And I know that that may sound a little silly, but listen to me seriously. The moment you identify what is happening, the minute you begin to label what is actually going on, the power you have over that thing is increased. In psychology, we would say it this way, "if you can name it, you can tame it," bro, so learn to call it what it is. In fact, that is my first step in helping you to live with and manage your anxious thoughts and feelings.

1. Call it what it is. Identify what's happening in your brain and in your body as anxiety or as anxious thoughts. This is your first step. This may sound a little like this: "my brain and body are experiencing anxiety." "Anxiety is totally an overreaction to normal things that are happening." . How about this one? "This isn't me, it's my anxiety." That even rhymed a little bit, right? You can also ask yourself these questions... "Is this thought inspiring? Is it motivating? Is it helpful? Does it help me to move forward?" If not, let's ask a better question. In fact, that's step number two. So step one is to call it what it is, identify it, label it, and...
2. Ask a better question. I find that anxiety asks all the wrong questions. It basically runs through all of the possible negative what if scenarios. And in the end, our brain and body are overrun with negative feelings. In psychology, we call this catastrophizing, which is the brain's tendency to always predict catastrophe. And then people who struggle with anxiety, man, that's what it's always doing. "Feelings follow focus," my friend. So ask a better question, and watch your brain chase those better questions, and come up with better solutions and answers. A better question would be:-"What can I do that would be helpful right now?" -- "What can I do right now that would be useful to me?" -- "What action can I take right now that would actually help me to solve this problem?" Ask better questions, my friend, and get better answers in your life. Answers that will empower you instead of help you to feel or motivate you to feel powerless and hopeless.
3. Take Action: So, step one, Call it what it is, Step two, Ask better questions to get better answers, and Step three, Take Action! Let me take you back to the analogy of the car being stuck in first gear. This step is all about you manually and power shifting that car into second, and third, fourth, and fifth gear. is where you manually shift the car into second, third, fourth and fifth gear. This means do anything! Remember, your anxious brain has a tendency to get paralyzed, to get stuck, and you're about to get it unstuck by doing anything that is valuable, that is active, that is smart, that is fun, that is meaningful, that is intelligent, that builds your relationships. This is the way out of that brain rut. There is no substitute here. In the end, you must have the courage to place yourself in those places that create discomfort, nervousness, anxiety, trusting that this process of calling things what they are, asking better questions, and taking action will raise your voice over that fear, over that anxiety, over that trauma.

    

4. Lastly, number four: Begin to devalue any thought or feeling that is not helpful and freeing. This is the final step for you to ultimately change your relationship to your thoughts and feelings. Now, you may not have thought about your feelings and thoughts in this way. Meaning I want you to see them as a relationship, something that you can respond and interact with instead of just something that you believe is YOU, but it actually isn't. What I'm here to help you to do is to change that relationship where you are now in control. You get to check your thoughts and feelings, and if they match your goals and objectives, use them. But if they don't, they are unimportant. They are just 'stinking thinking.' They're old trauma, old fears, old ideas, old anxiety, and they are not to take over your life, my friend.

Just a quick reminder. These are critical skills that I guarantee will help you in the short and long term. But it's also possible that you may be experiencing some additional things. These may include trauma or even some biological predispositions that may create some complications for you as you look to free your life from the fear and anxiety that sometimes ambushes you and afflicts you.

One more quick thing, my friend. Be patient and gentle with yourself. Be patient and gentle with your brain through this process. Do not neglect this last thought. Dealing with your body and brain in a gentle and patient way will yield better and longer lasting fruits, and it will ultimately enhance the outcomes you're seeking for. So when you feel anxious or fearful, call it what it is, but do so in a gentle and matter of fact kind of way, instead of "Why am I still feeling this way? When is this going to stop? I thought I was doing so good." Listen, you don't need this type of psychology. You just don't. Anyways, I hope this is helpful for you, my friend. There is help out there for you, by the way, you can text us and we will connect you with professionals that will help you, and help you to begin where you are with what you have. Thank you for being here and my friend, stay humble, Stay willing, stay dynamic.

Next